Last gen, it was determined that there wasn't much to differentiate the different Rotom formes, especially since a lot of the time they just ran defensive sets which did not even include their new signature moves. For this reason, they were counted together for usage and tiering purposes.

This time, however, while keeping the same stat distribution, each forme has an entirely different set of weaknesses and resistances as well. It is obvious from my experience so far that Rotom-H and Rotom-W are significantly "better" competitively than the other three, and for this reason I propose that each forme be counted and tiered separately.

I would assume that would be kind of a given here, just like how the Deoxys formes are technically the "same Pokemon" and can't be used at the same time on a team due to Species Clause, but they also all have starkly different movepools and stat spreads. The Rotom formes now each have a different typing, and should obviously be conted and tiered separately (but still counted as the same Pokemon for sleep clause).

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Honestly, I don't really think that species clause needs to prevent you from using multiple formes of a pokemon on the same team. I don't see why we need to prevent people from using Multiple formes of Deoxys, Wormadam, Rotom, Giratina, or Shaymin on the same team. They are all different enough in each form, that they could very easily count as separate Pokemon, and I feel that they all should not be subject to species clause between formes.

I'm going to have to disagree with the whole "keep them as the same Pokemon" thing. Before, all Rotom were basically the same Pokemon but with 5 different "egg" moves, but now they're actually completely different Pokemon. The only reason to restrict their use on a single team via Species Clause would be just to adhere to a Nintendo naming convention rather than because they're actually the same...

Basically I agree with RBG, but even if we didn't do that I still think Rotoms are even more distinctly different than other Formes so implementing Species Clause in that way is just arbitrary.

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Honestly, I don't really think that species clause needs to prevent you from using multiple formes of a pokemon on the same team. I don't see why we need to prevent people from using Multiple formes of Deoxys, Wormadam, Rotom, Giratina, or Shaymin on the same team. They are all different enough in each form, that they could very easily count as separate Pokemon, and I feel that they all should not be subject to species clause between formes.

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Shaymin-s can be reverted to its land forme if frozen during battle. In the event someone is using both Shaymin-s and Shaymin-l and Shaymin-s is frozen, they technically would be breaking species clause. This case cannot be applied to any of the other Pokemon that have been mentioned.

Last gen Rotom was somewhat of a borderline case, competitively almost identical, but having different sprites/movepool. This gen it's arguably more differentiated than certain Deoxys formes or Giratina, the different formes should be tiered separately.

As for the Species Clause, I would argue that keeping nintendo's rule is significantly more simple and less arbitrary. The whole point of the Species Clause is to prevent multiple same/similar sets from being overwhelming, complicating the rule in order to allow a small subset of same/similar sets in (both Giratinas, Deo-A+Deo-N, perhaps certain Shaymin sets due to Seed Flare) seems unnecessary. The Species Clause as nintendo defines it bars players from using two Pokemon with the same national dex number. This gives a very clear answer to any situation. Allowing different formes leaves a lot of middle ground cases which need to be cleared up (Gastrodon West and East? Unknown? May sound stupid, but they do have very minor competitive differences due to IV/Nature/Forme restrictions when not bred. And it's hard to define what a "large enough" competitive difference is in a simple way which will be unambiguous in every case.).

Additionally, editing the species clause would have the (possibly unintended) effect of allowing multiple Arceus formes, unless we went out of our way to specify that it is not counted. Both different Arceus formes and different Giratina formes have notable competitive differences (type or stats/ability) and a different sprite. They both share only a dex number and certain competitive attributes (less than, say, Charmander and Cyndaquil, who share the same Ability, type, and base stats).

If it's decided that we don't need to always follow in-game mechanics (which is certainly the way that the vote in the other thread is swinging, though it wasn't the way I voted), then count me as another who thinks Species Clause shouldn't always be justification for not allowing multiple formes in a team.

A change of stats alone, like with Dexoys and Giratina, might not be sufficient since it doesn't create a larger difference than what some abilities do--and certainly Huge Power Azumarill and Intimidate Arcanine aren't considered different species--but a change of type indicates a distinct Pokemon to me.

Edit: I started writing this before the above post was there and have to admit I didn't think of Arceus, which is a significant counter to my line of thinking. I'll need to think about this one some more--now I'm undecided. I still don't like the inconsistency of Rotom being considered the same Pokemon for Species Clause and yet not necessarily so for tiering, but Arceus is a strong point.

Second edit: Not sure if this was already implicit (I believe it was), but after jrrrrrrr's post I just want to be absolutely sure that I'm clear: if it was decided to always follow in-game mechanics, then of course we'd run with whatever the in-game Species Clause is.

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Enforcing our version of species clause would not be changing in game mechanics, so really, the results of that thread and this thread are not correlated.

That being said, although I think it would be nice to allow multiple formes, Eric is right in his listing of some pokemon that arguably would have to be allowed to be used if we decided to do this. I was trying to come up with a rule that would allow multiple formes of the same pokemon, to be allowed in battle, but was unable to, due to my (perhaps arbitrary) decision to exclude Arceus from this list, since the two guidelines I thought about including involved changing Type or Stats, but Arceus messed with this, as well as the Shaymin-s changing back to land forme when frozen (which is lame, but whatever).

It probably would be easier to just continue using Nintendo's definition of species clause, while tiering the formes of Shaymin, Rotom, Wormadam, Dexoys, and Giratina separately. I would still like to remove that, but I can't think of an easy way to.

Well since they are different, and actually significantly so, I don't necessarily see a reason why they need to be restricted under species clause. The Deoxys restriction originated from Gen 3, where which form you had depended on which game you used, and it was technically impossible for two different forms to exist on the same cartridge (and thus the same team).

We could just define a different "species" as something with a different type/base stats. That eliminates any possible Gastrodon confusion.

As for Shaymin-S, I really don't see it being an issue as it's going to die to an ice move before it gets frozen. If a player really wanted to "break" Species Clause by switching into an un-STAB Ice Beam off of 195 Sp. Atk or less while SR was not up, getting the 10% freeze chance, and switching out to activate Natural Cure, they would be left with a nearly useless Shaymin-L as a result, which would die to just about anything coming back in. I do not think we even need to consider the possibility of this happening, as if it did, whoever it happened to would be in a much worse position competitively than if they had just chosen a different pokemon to use from the start.

EDIT: Never mind what I said about Arceus, apparently as long as it's holding its plate it keeps its type change outside of battle. I could have sworn there was an "Arceus transformed" message when you sent it out, but I guess I was wrong.

Amazing how some of the most outspoken supporters of strict in-game adherence suddenly don't care about that in this thread...

But yeah, I don't see anything wrong with making each "forme" its own separate pokemon for tiering concerns. This is especially true now that they all have different typing. Washer and Toaster will probably be OU, everything else is mediocre at best so it doesn't even matter from a competitive standpoint. I think they should have all been considered separate formes in DP as well (since that's what we did with Giratina and Shaymin), but the time for that argument is long gone.

There is no game mechanic preventing you from using multiple forms on the same team as it is, or even multiples of the same species (hell, gym leaders do it all the time), so I don't see how it's a contradiction one way or the other. The supporters of in-game adherence have only ever said that we should follow mechanics, not rules.

Apparently I was wrong about Arceus though, it does keep its type change when it's in your party and not sent out. I swear I recall seeing "Arceus transformed" when it was sent out, or at least an animation of the sprite changing, but maybe that was just on Shoddy (or just in 4th gen).

Since it would only affect ubers, though, I'm sure we could just deem multiple Arceus to be overpowered, overcentralizing, or what have you, and limit it to one per team on those grounds (something I'm sure most ubers players would agree with). The precedent to at least make some attempt at keeping ubers competitive and more than just a simple banlist has already been set by the fact that it still has clauses. Some might argue "slippery slope" if we did this, but Arceus really is a special case. I would not advocate any other bans or restrictions from the tier.

While part of me wants to allow different formes to be on the same team, what Syberia suggests seems extremely forced, complicated, and while it does not go against mechanics, it does move us away from one of the few universal official rules in all remotely competitive venues (Battle Towers/Frontiers, Tournaments). The idea of introducing a new clause just for Arceus seems especially.. ugly.

There is no game mechanic preventing you from using multiple forms on the same team as it is, or even multiples of the same species (hell, gym leaders do it all the time), so I don't see how it's a contradiction one way or the other. The supporters of in-game adherence have only ever said that we should follow mechanics, not rules.

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The mechanic is that you can't even start a battle with multiple forms on the same team. We would be breaking game mechanics by even allowing users with multiple forms to challenge people, since that is impossible within the confines of the game.

I don't think we should even take Arceus into account as what makes it change its sprite+typing is the item it's holding. It seems to me it would be the same as treating Specsmence and CBMence as different pokémon. Same thing with Unown, as its only difference between formes besides the PID thing (lol seriously) is the sprite, and no way in hell we're going to let people use blue and green Salamence at the same time.

I agree that our Species Clause should allow alt. formes to be used on the same team, as they're pretty different on their own. None of them share the same base stats except for the five Rotom-App, and even then each of them have different typings in B/W.

The mechanic is that you can't even start a battle with multiple forms on the same team. We would be breaking game mechanics by even allowing users with multiple forms to challenge people, since that is impossible within the confines of the game.

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No, a mechanic in the sense every other PR poster is using it how the game works in the battle, the damage formula, effects of status. Changing clauses is specifically not a mechanic, so long as said clauses are possible within the game (forcing one player to forfeit if they put too many Pokemon to sleep). Actually, Philip gives a great definition on the adherence topic, which I assume you've already read, but:

Game Mechanics: This includes everything regarding how Pokemon battles actually function. A move's accuracy, secondary effect rate, critical hit rate, how it functions, how stat changes are determined, how EV's can be distributed, IV limitations, how priorities are determined, and even "glitches", are all part of the game's mechanics.

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Clauses/Rules: These are limitations that we place on competitive Pokemon as a community. These do NOT alter the game's mechanics in any way, and these are not what the debate is about. Saying that "Smogon already changes the game's mechanics by banning Pokemon and setting up clauses" is incorrect as defined by this topic, and posts claiming so will be deleted. Basically, clauses or rules are what we set up, and if people break them they are disqualified. We can use the simulator to prevent people from bringing banned Pokemon or moves into our standard battles. One way to look at this is to consider the simulator to be a judge that looks at your team before you battle and tells you whether or not you can play. Simple.

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I don't think we should even take Arceus into account as what makes it change its sprite+typing is the item it's holding.

In link battles, more than one Rotom forme is allowed as well as FC Wifi matches, so strict adherence would accomodate this.

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I was under the assumption that the Rotom formes had the same rules as the Wormadam forms.

Game Mechanics: This includes everything regarding how Pokemon battles actually function. A move's accuracy, secondary effect rate, critical hit rate, how it functions, how stat changes are determined, how EV's can be distributed, IV limitations, how priorities are determined, and even "glitches", are all part of the game's mechanics.

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Being able to start the battle has a significant effect on how Pokemon battles actually function, which is what I was trying to get at.

Sorry that this post didn't add much, I just thought it would be good to clarify what I was saying.